Wednesday, July 1, 2015

In Oct
2011, the Govt. declared an area covering nearly 2,000,000 square kilometres
(772,000 sq mi) of ocean shall be reserved as a shark sanctuary, making it the world's largest shark sanctuary. The tiny Nation has a long history – in the
recent pages, months before the attack on Pearl Harbor, Kwajalein Atoll was the
administrative center of the Japanese 6th Fleet Forces Service, whose task was
the defense of these islands. In World
War II, the United States, invaded and occupied the islands in 1944, destroying
or isolating the Japanese garrisons. The
battle here caused irreparable damage, especially on Japanese bases. During the
American bombing, the islands' population suffered from lack of food and
various injuries.

In 1979,
the Government here was officially established and the country became
self-governing.In 1986, the Compact of Free Association with the United States
entered into force, granting the Republic its sovereignty. The Compact provided
for aid and U.S. defense of the islands in exchange for continued U.S. military
use of the missile testing range at Kwajalein Atoll.

It is
the ‘Marshall Islands’- located near the equator in the Pacific Ocean;
geographically, part of the larger island group of Micronesia. The country's
population is spread out over 24 coral atolls, comprising 1,156 individual
islands and islets. The most populous atoll is Majuro, which also acts as the
capital.Micronesian colonists gradually settled the Marshall Islands from earlier years and the European powers
recognized the islands as part of the Spanish East Indies in 1874. However,
Spain sold the islands to the German Empire in 1884. In World War I, Japan
occupied the Marshall Islands, which in 1919 the League of Nations combined
with other former German territories to form the South Pacific Mandate. In
World War II, the United States conquered the islands in the Gilbert and
Marshall Islands campaign.

Politically,
the Marshall Islands is a presidential republic in free association with the
United States, with the US providing defence, subsidies, and
access to U.S. based agencies such as the FCC and the USPS. Health officials in
the Marshall Islands are reporting a surge in chikungunya cases with the latest
tally at more than 800 cases since February 2015. Of these, 80 percent of cases
were from the Capital, Majuro. This is the first known outbreak of Chikungunya
in the Marshall Islands and follows on the heels of a major outbreak in
Kiribati earlier this year. An effort
was launched spraying mosquito breeding
areas around Majuro Atoll.

We
are reading about this island as there is news of the tiny island taking our
Nation to the Court. Times
of India reports that an year ago, the tiny island
republic in the Pacific Ocean, made an impassioned plea to the International Court
of Justice (ICJ) seeking initiation of proceedings against India for not
pursuing nuclear disarmament, but India is yet to file response to it. The tiny Nation suffered miserably during
World War II and, later, the US used some of its islands as the testing site
for its nuclear weaponry , which it nick named Pacific Proving Grounds.

The
nuclear non-proliferation treaty (NPT) came into force 45 years ago and the ICJ
in its advisory opinion on July 8, 1996 had said: “There exists an obligation
to pursue in good faith and bring to a conclusion negotiations leading to
nuclear disarmament in all its aspects under strict and effective international
control.“

Marshall
Islands, which received over $700 million in compensation from the US in the
last century for the adverse effects of nuclear weapons testing, strongly feels
that the nuclear arms race between India and Pakistan could pose a huge danger
to world peace, both being NPT non-signatories.
The report states that last month, the ICJ accepted India's request and
gave it time till September 16 to file its reply to Marshall Is lands'
application. The court had on June 16 last year given India time till December
16, 2014. The time was again extended till June 16 and now to September 16.

The
island republic's grievance is that “India continues to breach its obligations
under customary international law, including specifically its obligation to
pursue in good faith negotiations to cease the nuclear arms race at an early
date, as well as to pursue in good faith negotiations leading to nuclear
disarmament in all its aspects under strict and effective international
control“.

Sounds
strange that they are targetting India when there are bigger players in the
field of nuclear armament – some who have used and some who threaten and some
who have the capabilities. The nuclear
non-proliferation treaty (NPT) proclaims that
its objective is to prevent the spread of nuclear weapons and weapons
technology, to promote cooperation in the peaceful uses of nuclear energy and
to further the goal of achieving nuclear disarmament and general and complete
disarmament. A total of 190 parties have joined the Treaty, including the five
nuclear-weapon States.Four UN member states
have never signed the treatyare : India, Israel, Pakistan, and South Sudan.